Bulletproof Vests and Sweatpants
by Shiggity Shwa
Summary: My first and only fluff fic. After Sam gets a little too friendly with another woman at the SRU, Jules changes their dinner plans. Sam/Jules. Jules POV.


_A/N: This is my one and only attempt at fluff. You will never see it again. Never again. That being said this is a gift Fic for SYuuri who is in love with the character Raina and desperately wants her to have an elicit affair with Sam. I kid of course. She actually wanted me to make sure everyone knows how much she "hates that bitch". However, her hatred for Raina is only matched by my hatred for Steve. So Magoo. So very very Magoo. _

__Bulletproof Vests and Sweatpants

The front door cracks open and jams like it usually does when the Toronto weather nosedives into negative territory. She hears it bounce off the back wall. A million times. A million times she's told him not to let the door hit the freaking wall she spent days building, priming and painting. Does he listen? No.

A snarl tickles at her lips as she palms the black t-shirt from the back of the bathroom door. She doesn't remember abandoning it there, but laying her nose against the fabric, it smells of detergent and not perspiration. So she bunches the material, yanks it over her ponytailed head and she shakes her bangs free of static.

The movements are rapid, because if he catches her bare bra-ed he might think it's open season when it's definitely not. But there isn't clomping footsteps of shoes probably packed with clods of early winter mud ascending the stairs. Instead from the bottom, in way completely unreminiscent of Romeo and Juliet he calls, "Ready?"

Their relationship has been reduced and simmered to crude monosyllabic words which will soon devolve into vowels. Stepping out of the bathroom and into the hallway, she stops short, toes curling over the decline to the first stair. Nimble fingers steady her ponytail, fan out her bangs, and stretch out the shirt to cover her hips over an old pair of sweatpants. She pads down the stairs, bare feet slapping against cold hardwood.

Sam stands at the front door. He's clad in fancy black dress pants and a smooth, crisp white dress shirt. His face contorts as he examines her attire. Eyes squint and follow her as she disappears behind a half wall and into the kitchen. "You're not dressed."

"I'm wearing clothes," she retorts and leans her back against the island. A quick sideways glance divulges him toeing off his shoes and approaching the kitchen. Well at least they might talk about it. It might be in monosyllabic grunts, but at least they'll talk.

"I thought we were going out?"

"I don't feel like going out."

"Okay."

He hides behind the barstools, his hands wringing around the spokes. A few moments of silence scuttle between them and she figures that their conversation is over. Their grunts and growls are put to bed. She sighs, not loudly, or in anger, or even forlornly. Just in disappointment.

Her nails play at the edging on the pantry doors and she finds some potatoes that are about to grow eyes, so she hauls out the quarter bag. Mashed potatoes make for a pretty good comfort food. When she tosses the sack up on the island he asks, "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine."

"Are you feeling okay?"

"I'm fine."

"Is it your time of the—"

"Sam, you're about two seconds away from having a potato jammed into your eye socket."

"Sorry." His hands raise in a false surrender and he shuffles around to the end of the island, still guarded. "Can I help?"

"No." Pots and pans clang in the corner cabinet as she blindly fishes for something big enough to hold potatoes. Fingers curl around the unyielding edge of a thick metal handle. She pulls out a fair sized pot from depths so far back in the cupboard, it might be a different country. "I'd like to eat unburned food at least once this week."

"Okay, what is wrong with you?"

The pot crashes into the sink. The metal on metal reverberates through the empty room for a split second before she drowns the noise by turning on the tap. Might as well get down to the 'er's, 'uh's, and 'eh's of it. Her fingers wiggle under the lukewarm water and without glancing up she informs, "I saw you today with that girl."

"What? What girl"

"The one you were talking to." Hands churn potatoes in the water, bathing them, skins still unflayed. Sometimes mashed potatoes are better that way. Sometimes you need to get your nutrients in. It can't all be sweet. "You two were standing close and talking outside the SRU."

"Oh, you mean Raina?"

"Great, she has a name."

"She was one of the people who were stuck underground after those bombs exploded downtown a few months ago. Her legs were crushed; it's a miracle that she can walk."

Her hand acts as a dam, a sieve to keep the potatoes in their place while allowing the dirty water to pour into the sink and swirl down the drain. "I saw the way she looked at you Sam."

He shrugs, the tiniest ghost of a smile on his lips. "She might have a small case of hero worship."

Great, it's not like she didn't already have his ego to deal with, then this girl comes along and—"I saw the way you looked at her."

"Wait a minute," He gains the courage to fully approach her side. The functional side. The side with the food and the sink. The nurturing side. "Are you jealous?"

The pot is on its second refill when her brain digests the question. Potatoes bob to the top of the water like bodies in a river. After the immediate comprehension and her chagrin she answers, "No."

"Jules, are we honestly not going out because you're jealous?"

Something snaps. A nerve. A tendon. A bone. The abstract concept of a monogamous relationship. She slams the metal pot into the sink again. Full of water, potatoes, and gurgled words. The sound clashes through the empty kitchen, echoing off the walls and she's permanently dented the sink with the dense pot rim. "Why don't you ask Raina?"

"Well for one thing I've only met her twice in passing. For another I have a girlfriend."

Wet palms rub against the fleecy material on her sweatpants. She abandons the pot, potatoes and all, in the sink for the refuge of the couch in the conjoining front room. "Sam, you were flirting with her."

He trails her, not like a puppy, more like a boyfriend who desperately doesn't want to be in the doghouse tonight. "I was laughing because the guys were watching." His hands slice in short arches through the air as he talks, accentuating his point. "Besides how do you think I felt when you were with Steve?"

Her heel spins against the hardwood floors so fast he needs to lurch back to compensate their closeness. "We were broken up Sam. That's what people do when they're broken up. They date other people."

"Sweetheart," he softly chuckles, hands hovering in the air. Wanting to, but not daring to touch her. She glances to them with indignation. "Despite whatever may be happening here, I don't want to be with anyone else."

"She's younger."

"She's inexperienced and probably full of drama."

"She's prettier than me."

"Jules, she is not prettier than you."

"Uh huh." Her feet trek over hardwood until it transforms into an area rug. Not exactly soft, but more welcoming than floors which cool down with the night and the plummeting temperature. She flops onto the couch, arms crossing over her chest to insulate her body. A few seconds later the couch gains a second, weightier depression.

"Jules, you're gorgeous." The tips of his fingers graze her forearm. They recoil before his hands wring around her biceps like she's a kitchen barstool and he drags her towards him. "You're freezing. How can you be this angry and this cold?"

Despite her initial resistance, she's pulled fully into his lap. Her side against his chest, her back against the arm of the couch. The warmth sends pinpricks over her skin and regardless of her irritation or Lord forbid, her jealousy, she begins to relax against him. "It's this stupid t-shirt."

Pulling at the loose fabric wrinkling on her stomach he informs, "This is my shirt."

"This is yours?" The bottom of the shirt stretches while she tries to translate the design. Some random pattern of white on black. Haphazard symbols that don't mean a thing to her. She should've known it belonged to him. Must've known and didn't care, even through the rage.

"It's not Steve's is it?"

Before she can slap him, he adjusts his arms around her back and legs. Instead she offers an expressional warning. Next time the results will be the physicality of her hand on the side of his head. She sighs again, this time forlornly. "We're becoming one of those couples who wear each other's clothes and don't know it."

"You can wear my clothes all you want. If I start wearing yours, we have a problem." It's like he doesn't care, or doesn't understand that drastic implication or symbolism that sharing clothing has. She's never has the chance to share clothes with someone before. Four brothers, no mother or sisters. She's sure he's never done it either. Two sisters and an unapproachable father. It seems overly personal.

Her head rests in the crook of his neck, his fingers weave their way between hers and he lifts them to do interpretive dances in the air. "Maybe I should wear more dresses." It's more of an aloud musing than a question for him to answer.

"It's wintertime."

"But at least I'll look more feminine."

"And you'll freeze to death."

"So I'm predestined to wear bulletproof vests and sweatpants for the rest of my life?" She pictures of herself in uniform. Pictures herself in sweats. Pictures herself in the macabre mixture of both. Like some soccer mom from the future.

"Well at work you don't have much of a choice." There's the light pressure of his thumb as it runs languidly over the rim of her waistband. He dips his head and whispers into her ear, "But don't bad mouth the sweats."

Gray. They're gray. And cotton. And gray. She used to get them in other colors, but some tragic fate would befall those pants. Laundry accidents, caught in bike spokes, tomato sauce stains. "They're so plain."

"Jules, the way they fit you makes me want to cry. You wear everything perfectly, but you wear sweats the best."

Her nose crinkles, she wants to call bullshit, but the way his hand lands on his thigh, not really caressing but not exactly remaining still, somehow proves to her that it's true. "Really?"

He smiles, not lopsided or full of his ego. It's reserved, truthful like what he's saying to her has meaning, at least to him. "I get worried when you wear them at SRU workouts because of the guys on other teams."

"You don't have to worry about other guys."

"Just like you don't have to worry."

"But she's so—"

"It doesn't matter what she is Jules. She isn't you."

Somehow the fight is over. Somehow they surpassed the caveman grunts. Somehow they skipped over the part where he treats her like she's waving a gun around, like her demands are crazy, like she's a subject. Omitted where she pretends to accept his words and then three minutes later explodes, verbally ensnares him and sends him home until he eventually comes back.

Hand centered on his chest, she pushes herself off the couch. The strained shirt hem droops to well below her hips now. It clings to her legs like Sam's hands and she really should've known it was his shirt. "Do you want this back?"

"Nah." He grins, with the addition of a half-lidded lustful gaze from where his body is packed into the corner of the couch. "It looks better on you."

"I meant right now."

"Why?" An eyebrow cautiously peaks. It's because he thinks this is the trap part. Because he also knows their dance way too well. "Are we going out?"

Fingers hook under the collar of his shirt, with a small amount of force, she manages to tug him forward so he's sitting up straight. The tip of her nose brushes against his. "Only if you think we'll have more fun that way."

* * *

><p><em>PS - You know how you can tell it's a fluff? There's no mention of vomiting or condoms. I'm losing my touch. <em>


End file.
